Friends and family mourn N.Y. woman found dead in Turkey

Staten Island's Sarai Sierra was reportedly found dead in Turkey, where she had been on vacation. Getty Images

Friends and family of Sarai Sierra, the Staten Island woman believed to have been killed in Turkey, are wondering whether they could have done more to bring her back home alive, the Staten Island Advance reports.

"If I went with her, maybe this wouldn't have happened," the Advance quotes Sierra’s longtime friend Maggie Rodriguez — who was to have traveled to Istanbul with Sierra — as saying. "Maybe we would have went to a different spot that day. Maybe we'd be sitting in a cafe, just chit chatting with each other."

Turkey's state-run news agency said the body of a woman was discovered near the remnants of ancient city walls. Police later identified the body as Sierra's, a 33-year-old married mother of two.

Sierra, who had also traveled to Amsterdam, Netherlands, and Munich, Germany, to pursue her interest in photography, was last heard from on Jan. 21, the day she was to return home, the Associated Press reported earlier today.

Turkish police were apparently questioning nine people in connection with the death.
The body was found near a bridge frequented by tourists wanting to photograph the dozens of tankers waiting to access the Bosporus Strait, the dividing line between Asia and Europe.